Cancer is a fungus. And can be cured by baking soda. Barmy

So claims the notoriously accurate David Icke. I was alerted to this nonsense by a conspiracy-obsessed friend on Facebook.

One such case is the Italian doctor, Tullio Simoncini, a brilliant and courageous man who has refused to bow to the enormous pressure he has faced, and continues to face, after he realised what cancer is and how it can be dealt with.

Simoncini's 'crime' has been to discover that cancer is a fungus caused by Candida, a yeast-like organism that lives in the body in small amounts even in healthy people. The immune system keeps it under control normally, but when the Candida morphs into a powerful fungus some serious health problems can follow - including cancer.

Naturally, Icke has an explanation for why Big Pharma is trying to silence Simoncini (I can't bring myself to give him the title "Doctor").

But look at what has been happening as cancer numbers worldwide have soared and soared. There has been a calculated war on the human immune system that has got more vociferous with every decade.

The immune system is weakened and attacked by food and drink additives, chemical farming, vaccinations, electromagnetic and microwave technology and frequencies, pharmaceutical drugs, the stress of modern 'life', and so much more.

What defences are today's children going to have when they are given 25 vaccinations and combinations of them, before the age of two - while their immune system is still forming for goodness sake?

This is how the Illuminati families are seeking to instigate a mass cull of the population. By dismantling the body's natural defence to disease.

Yes, of course it's all a dastardly plan by those blood-sucking lizards to keep the human population down. How could we ever have doubted otherwise?

We can leave aside Icke's deluded ravings, but cancer is a serious business. Cancerous cells reproduce uncontrollably inside the body, invading and destroying healthy tissue. Generally, the only treatment is to remove the cancerous cells, and then follow up with courses of radiation or chemotherapy, to ensure all the cells are destroyed. This also damages healthy tissue, and unfortunately doesn't always succeed. The prognosis for some cancer survivors, even after surgery, may be less than 50/50.

Given such an unpromising diagnosis, it's understandable, I suppose, that many turn to alternative (or as I like to call them, untested and dangerous) treatments. And this is where quacks like Simoncini enter the picture. According to Icke:

Instead, Simoncini found something much, much simpler - sodium bicarbonate. Yes, the main ingredient in good old baking soda (but I stress not the same as baking soda, which has other ingredients).

He used this because it is a powerful destroyer of fungus and, unlike the drugs, the Candida cannot 'adapt' to it. The patient is given sodium bicarbonate orally and through internal means like an endoscope, a long thin tube that doctors use to see inside the body without surgery. This allows the sodium bicarbonate to be placed directly on the cancer - the fungus.

Baking soda. 

A quick bio of Simoncini:

Tullio Simoncini lost his offcial license to practice medicine in 2003  in Italy. On May 2006 he was convicted to 3 y. for manslaughter of the first patient and 16 months for having charged 7.500 EUR each to the other 2 patients.

Even a prison sentence didn't stop him. In 2010, a Scottish man suffering from cancer turned to Simoncini after refusing chemotherapy on the NHS.

"I've always refused chemotherapy because it just kills your immune system. I think if I'd gone through it I'd maybe even be dead by now.

Of course, Simoncini's baking soda doesn't come for free.

He has agreed to treat Mr Fyvie, from Musselburgh, but they must come up with £10,000 by 21 March to make the procedure happen.

He has the full backing of his children, one of whom ran a sponsored ten miles on Friday to add to the £1,200 they have already collected.

£10,000. One pound of baking soda costs £1.47 from American Soda. By my calculation, that money could have bought 6,802 pounds of baking soda. That's one big shopping trolley.

In any case, it did Fyvie little good, because within six months, he was dead.

The family of Robert Fyvie has been left devastated after he passed away last Friday morning, with his 10-year-old son, Marc, distraught his dad will not be there to see his first boxing match.

Mr Fyvie, 54, of Eskview Terrace, died peacefully beside his wife Angie as they slept, five months after he travelled to Rome in the hope that a cutting-edge treatment would help him overcome his illness. Sadly, it was not to be.

Still, presumably Simoncini put the money to good use.

I do think Fyvie's actions were fundamentally irresponsible towards himself and his family - he also travelled to Thailand for herbal treatments for cancer, and refused chemo, so he was dicing with death anyway. But Simoncini deserves nothing but shame for taking an obscene amount of money from a dying man and his desperate family for his sham treatments. People like that are wasting perfectly good oxygen for the rest of us.

Things I've found interesting lately

• Johann Hari has an excellent idea for the tax-dodging, big-government-hating, billionaire Philip Green.

• Theresa May has, if not actually ruled out, certainly indicated she doesn't want water cannons used for attacking protesters - unsurprisingly, the Met are still quite keen on the idea of blasting out people's eyeballs in a government-approved fashion.

• And Cabbages, and Kings eloquently puts forward the free speech argument in favour of allowing Pastor Terry Jones, he of failing to burn the Qu'ran fame, to come to Britain and preach his tired, racist old rhetoric in Luton - Jon Cruddas, in the Guardian, argues from the opposite angle.

• As blogged by PZ Myers and Orac, among others I assume, there's clearly no boundary to the lunacy that alternative medicine fraudsters practitioners are willing to accept.

Nephrotic syndrome, or how my son was saved by science-based medicine

Most parents despair when their child wets the bed. I, on the other hand, am quietly relieved.

I'm not a specialist medical blogger like Orac, but I'll stick my oar in anyway. My son suffers from minimal change nephrotic syndrome, and has done since he was 2 (he's 8 now). It's a scary condition to have, especially if it's not caught early on. In his case, he was quite far gone when it was diagnosed, and we (my partner and I) stayed in hospital with him for two weeks while he was treated.

He swelled up, and this is probably the most accurate way to describe it, like a water balloon. Literally, his body was full of water which he could no longer pass. At one point his penis was grossly distended with water, the consequences of which could almost have been funny if it hadn't been so serious.

Nephrotic syndrome, as I understand it, is an immune reaction disorder. Pretty much every time in the last 6 years that my son's caught a cold, he's had a relapse of nephrotic syndrome. In layman's terms, his kidneys become inflamed, and can no longer effectively pass waste and water.

He stops urinating, and when he does it usually includes protein. The excess water stays in the body, leaking through the blood vessels, placing more of a strain on his body and exacerbating the condition. This is what I mean when I say his bedwetting is a relief - it means his kidneys are doing their job and flushing out the excess water.

When he first went into hospital, he was immediately put on a high dose of prednisolone, a steroid, which kickstarted his kidneys and, eventually, allowed him to start improving. He's had maybe a dozen relapses since, which have variously been treated with steroids to bring him into remission, and cyclophosphamide and cyclosporin to keep the illness under control.

Things are looking up though, as the last two relapses he's had, he's gone back into remission within a week, without having to go back onto a course of steroids. The doctors have always stressed that most children grow out of minimal change syndrome, but this is the first actual sign of that.

I hasten to add, he's still on cyclosporin, keeping the disease under control.

This is a personal reason why I believe science-based medicine is so important. My son would not be here were it not for the treatment he received, and continues to receive.

If we had ever taken the advice of homeopaths and the like, we would have been preparing to bury him years ago.

For minimal change disease, steroids are in order.
But if you’re into a safer and more natural approach, we recommend  Kidney Dr , a 100% herbal treatment for natural kidney support to help maintain healthy renal functioning.

Safer? Good luck with that one.

MY SON TUTU IS 6 YEARS NOW.WHILE HE WAS 14 MONTHS,he was affected by nephrotic syndrome.that disease is continueing now also.from that time onwards due to the advice of a nephrologist v r giving prednisolone.sometimes there will be swellings on his body.now with this i started to give homeo medicine from 1 year onwards.if i continue with homeo,will it be cured ?

In a word, no. There's no known root cause for nephrotic, nor any cure. Don't let that put you off going to a homeopath, though.They'll still be happy to take your money.

Hello
Unfortunately, I don't think anyone can answer your question about a cure for nephrotic syndrome.  Homeopathic medicine can help people overcome many conditions, but there is no guarantee of cure.  The chances are greater if you consult with an experienced homeopathic practitioner and utilize any other methods of healing that are available, such as nutrition, supplements, or other methods.  Often, when cure is not possible, one still can minimize the effects of their disease and use as few medications as possible.
Thanks for your question and good luck to you and your son.
Dr Conner 

Even the followup posters have no idea what's going on.

My brother contracted Nephrotic syndrome when he was about 6 he is now 18.

He also drinks a cup of Georges Aloe Vera Juice every couple days. My parents learned of this from a doctor who had used it.

With this and astragalus root he has had to take prednisone for a less than a year total in the 12 years he has had this disease. He only takes prednisone when he has a relapse until he is healthy again.

The Aloe Vera juice is so good that is doesn't prevent him having relapses? And he still needs steroids (ie. scientific medicine) to bring him back into remission? Three cheers for the woo!

As I said, my son's still here thanks to science-based medicine, for which I am grateful. I sincerely hope no-one ever tries to do the same thing with "alternative" medicine.